Announced April 12 by Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, Partnership for Patients is a public-private collaboration that includes hospitals, employers, health plans, physicians, nurses and patient advocates.

“I am proud that UC Davis Medical Center is among the more than 500 hospitals, as well as physicians and nurses groups, consumer groups, and employers that have agreed to the new initiative,” said Ann Madden Rice, CEO of UC Davis Medical Center. “Providing safe, high-quality care to our patients is our top priority at UC Davis Medical Center. We are committed to being one of the safest hospitals in the nation.”

The initiative will focus on hospital safety with the goal of reducing patient-care injuries by 40 percent, saving 60,000 lives and reducing hospital readmissions by 20 percent over the next three years. In addition to saving lives, Sebelius praises the partnership’s potential to save up to $35 billion in health-care costs, including up to $10 billion for Medicare alone.

UC Davis Medical Center ranks among The Leapfrog Group’s top 65 U.S. hospitals for 2010, a distinction that recognizes hospital performance in crucial areas of patient safety and quality.

UC Davis Medical Center ranks among The Leapfrog Group’s top 65 U.S. hospitals for 2010, a distinction that recognizes hospital performance in crucial areas of patient safety and quality.

The Leapfrog Group is a nonprofit coalition of some of the nation’s largest employers and health-care purchasers who are working for improvements in health-care safety, quality and affordability for their employees and dependents. The top-hospitals ranking is based on Leapfrog’s national survey of 1,200 hospitals that volunteer publicly to report their performance. UC Davis Medical Center met a variety of performance measures to receive designation as a Top Hospital. In addition, Leapfrog measured hospitals on their progress in preventing infections and other hospital-acquired conditions, and adopting policies on the handling of serious medical errors, among other factors.

UC Davis Medical Center and other UC medical centers are participating in The Joint Commission’s patient-safety program, which focuses on hand hygiene. UC Davis also is a part of a UC-led patient-safety initiative to reduce central-line-associated bloodstream infections in adult, non-burn intensive care units.